Imagine your website is a beautiful, modern house. You paint the walls, you mow the lawn, and you invite guests over. But there is a problem you can’t see: termites are eating the foundation.
In the digital world, this is called Link Rot. It is the natural decay of the internet. You link to a cool article, a product, or a partner website, and two years later, that site shuts down. Now, your link goes nowhere.
You didn't do anything wrong, but your website is now full of holes. If you don't check broken links regularly, your visitors will get frustrated, and Google will think your "house" is abandoned.
The Scale of the Problem
Why "Link Rot" Kills SEO
Google employs "Crawlers" (robots) to scan your website. Think of them as delivery drivers. They drive from link to link, delivering your content to the search results.
When a crawler hits a broken link, it is like a bridge that has collapsed. The driver has to stop, turn around, and find another way. This wastes Google's time (called "Crawl Budget"). If your site has too many collapsed bridges, the driver stops coming to your town entirely.
The Tools: How to Automate Your Internal Link Audit
You cannot check every link manually. If your site has 100 pages, you might have 5,000 links. You need robots to fight the robots. Here are the best tools for the job, ranked by difficulty.
1. The Beginner Option: Broken Link Checker (WordPress Plugin)
If you use WordPress, this is the easiest way to start. You install the plugin, and it scans your site in the background. When it finds a dead link, it emails you.
Pros: Free, easy, works inside your dashboard.
Cons: It can slow down your website if you leave it running all the time. Use it once a month, then turn it off.
2. The Google Option: Search Console
Google tells you exactly which links it hates. Log in to Google Search Console and look at the "Indexing" report. It will show you 404 errors found during their crawl.
Pros: Accurate (it comes straight from Google).
Cons: It only finds broken pages on your site, not external links to other sites.
3. The Pro Option: Screaming Frog SEO Spider
This is the tool professional SEOs use. It is a desktop app that mimics Google. You type in your URL, hit "Start," and it crawls every single inch of your site.
The Workflow:
- Download Screaming Frog (Free for up to 500 URLs).
- Enter your domain.
- Filter by "Response Codes" > "Client Error (4xx)".
- Export the list to Excel.
4. The Enterprise Option: Ahrefs / Semrush
If you have a budget, these cloud tools run an internal link audit automatically every week. They send you a "Health Score" and a list of new broken links. This is the "set it and forget it" method.
How to Fix Dead Links (The Decision Tree)
Once you have your list of 50 broken links, what do you do? You have three choices.
| Scenario | The Fix |
|---|---|
| The External Site Died (e.g., You linked to a news article that is gone) |
Unlink it. Just remove the hyperlink but keep the text. Or, find a new source (Wayback Machine or a similar article) and update the link. |
| You Changed Your URL (e.g., You linked to your own /services page, but moved it) |
Update the Link. Go into the post and change the URL to the new one. Don't rely on redirects if you don't have to. |
| The Typo (e.g., You linked to gogle.com instead of google.com) |
Fix the Spelling. This is the most common and easiest fix. |
✅ Pro Tip: The "Hidden" Broken Links
Don't just check text links! Images have links too. If you link to an image hosted on another site (hotlinking) and they delete it, your page will show a broken image icon. Screaming Frog can help you find these "broken image" links as well.
Internal vs. External: Which is Worse?
Internal Broken Links (links from your Page A to your Page B) are embarrassing. They are 100% your fault and easy to fix. They hurt your SEO the most because they break your site structure.
External Broken Links (links from your Page A to Wikipedia) are annoying but forgiveable. Google knows you don't control Wikipedia. However, if you have too many, Google thinks your content is outdated.
💡 The "Link Rot" Maintenance Schedule
- Small Sites (Under 100 pages): Run a scan once every 3 months.
- Large Sites / E-commerce: Run a scan once a month.
- After a Migration: Run a scan immediately after changing themes or moving hosts.
Too Many Broken Links to Count?
If your audit tool came back with 1,000+ errors, don't panic. Our team specializes in large-scale cleanup. We can scrub your link profile, set up proper redirects, and stop the rot.
Clean My Website Links
